Political Quotes

“Madam President, in my opening speech about the rightwing scheme to capture the Court, the Supreme Court, I described the secret strategy memo that Lewis Powell wrote on the eve of his appointment to the Court about how to deploy corporate political power. As a Justice of the Supreme Court, Powell had the chance to prove to the corporate world his secret memo's theory of what could be achieved by ``exploiting judicial action''--his phrase--particularly with, as he called it, ``an activist-minded Supreme Court.'' Second, Powell had the chance on the Court to start laying the legal groundwork for precisely the sort of corporate political activity that his secret memo had recommended to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and Powell did both. The first case that allowed Powell to implement recommendations from his secret report came in 1976, in a case about the Federal Election Campaign Act. The case was Buckley v. Valeo, and the decision was a beast--138 pages, with another 83 pages of dissent and concurrence cobbled together by the Court with what one observer called ``extraordinary speed.'' Five Justices in that case, including Powell, were described as First Amendment hawks who were wary of any portion of the Federal Election Campaign Act that could inhibit free speech and association. Now, you have to understand that free speech and association were buzz words for corporate political activity precisely of the sort championed in Powell's secret chamber memo.…”